


songs amidst the waves

by madnessiseverything



Series: cr daily drabbles [9]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Bonding, Flowers, and i love the visual of singing in the middle of the ocean at night, celestial, i just want yasha and caleb to speak some more celestial okay, pre-Darktow, this takes place after meeting avantika and before darktow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 13:27:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18550702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madnessiseverything/pseuds/madnessiseverything
Summary: Yasha scratches at her neck. “I- uh. I have a question- maybe a favor, I don’t know.” She steps closer and Caleb shuts his book. He moves to get up but Yasha quickly continues. “The- the language.”Caleb stops and looks up at her, puzzled. “Language?”Yasha carefully settles onto the wood in front of him and exhales. “The one we both speak. I don’t… Could we maybe speak it?”or the one where Caleb and Yasha have a conversation about flowers in Celestial and Beau and Jester witness.





	songs amidst the waves

**Author's Note:**

> i have so many ideas about yasha and caleb speaking celestial in different circumstances and this one is just so visually pleasing that i finally got myself to write it. hope you enjoy!

Yasha steps onto the wooden deck of the Squalleater and breathes in the night air. She can’t help but smile softly as her ears pick up Jester yelling for Frumpkin. She turns her head to find the tiefling leaning over the railing to where Frumpkin must be swimming alongside the ship.   
  
“Come on, Frumpy! I know you can do a twirl, I saw you doing it!”   
  
Yasha ponders whether she should take a glance into the waves to see if Frumpkin follows Jester’s commands, but reminds herself of why she came up here in the first place. She rolls her shoulders and scans the deck for Caleb.   
  
She finds him sitting cross-legged next to the main mast, eyes locked onto his spellbook and a single orb of light floating above his head. Yasha nods to herself and makes her way across the ship, carefully avoiding contact with Avantika’s crew. She has a mission.   
  
A few steps out from Caleb’s spot she clears her throat. “Uh, Caleb?”   
  
The wizard looks up with surprise in his eyes. “Ja?”   
  
Yasha scratches at her neck. “I- uh. I have a question- maybe a favor, I don’t know.” She steps closer and Caleb shuts his book. He moves to get up but Yasha quickly continues. “The- the language.”   
  
Caleb stops and looks up at her, puzzled. “Language?”   
  
Yasha carefully settles onto the wood in front of him and exhales. “The one we both speak. I don’t… Could we maybe speak it?”   
  
Caleb’s confusion morphs into surprise, then an odd mix of that specific Caleb excitement that Yasha has only seen directed at magic related things. “Of course, we can do that. I would not mind.”   
  
Yasha relaxes and places her hands in her lap. “Thank you,” she tells him in that wonderful song she hasn’t spoken since the party first saw her wings. Something loosens in her chest at the look of wonder in Caleb’s eyes.   
  
“I am glad to uh, be of help,” he responds. He sounds different than her, lower. His accent doesn’t shine through like she thought it would when he first spoke to her back on the way to the swamp. But there is certain care in the way he sings that reminds her of her Abyssal - out of practice but not enough for it to hinder the sounds.

“I miss speaking it,” she admits and curls her fingers into her palm. She didn’t think up a topic but feels the weight of her flower book in her belt. She wonders if Caleb likes flowers beyond the fact that Nott braids them into his hair as a lucky charm. She never thought to ask before.  
  
“I have not spoken it in many years, apart from to you,” Caleb says and leans back into the mast. “It is quite a unique language.”   
  
Yasha smiles and reaches for the book. “It is. It’s beautiful.”   
  
Caleb nods. His eyes are focused on her in a way that makes her drop his gaze and pull out the book just to busy her hands. “Did many people in your home speak it?”   
  
Yasha swallows and opens the book. “I don’t- Some. I always assumed it was a Xhorhas tribe thing, you know?”   
  
Caleb gives a wry smile at that. “I learned it as the language of celestial beings, angels and the like.”   
  
Yasha remembers his first question to her back then and smiles back. Caleb’s eyes wander down to her book and she blinks. It was open on a small yellow flower, wrinkled from where Yasha had dropped it in a bed of rocks. She looks back up.   
  
“I found it in a field of them. They were mostly this color but there were a few that were darker.” She doesn’t know why she mentions it, but a new kind of smile that she hadn’t seen on Caleb before shines in his eyes. She thinks that’s a good thing.   
  
“My hometown,” Caleb starts and takes a small, shuddering breath. Yasha waits, patient. “It was surrounded by fields of flowers. As a child, it always was a perfect hiding spot.” Caleb’s eyes seem distant, but the smile is still on his face. It suits him, she muses and wishes he’d do it more often.   
  
She turns the page but doesn’t look down. “That sounds beautiful,” she says softly and Caleb nods. She can’t even imagine the view of fields like the one she has found many of her flowers in, right next to each other.   
  
Caleb looks at her. “It was. I don’t believe I quite appreciated it as a child, but one grows to see the beauty in nature.”   
  
“What colors were they?” She asks, glancing down at red petals. They almost seem pink in the dim light of Caleb’s floating orb. She imagines fields of red, of yellow, purple and blue.   
  
“The biggest field had these lovely yellow ones,” he says with a smile. “The one you have reminded me of them.” He looks down and nods. “We also had some of a similar color to that one, though ours had more red in them.”   
  
Yasha smiles. “I found these near a river. The plant was almost inside of the water.”   
  
Caleb hums. “Have you seen the flowers that float on top of water? They are quite lovely.”   
  
\-   
  
Jester watches Frumpkin dip beneath the waves and huffs. She pushes away from the railing but stops short when she hears the sound of singing. Her eyes widen with excitement and she whirls around.   
  
Yasha and Caleb are sitting in the middle of the ship, Yasha’s book of flowers between them. They are singing in what Jester remembers is the language Caleb had called ‘nerdy’. It sounds beautiful. Not quite as beautiful as her mother’s songs, but beautiful nonetheless.   
  
Excitedly, Jester plops down and grabs her sketchbook. She has to draw this.   
  
Before her quill can hit paper, Beau appears at her side. “What do you think they’re talking about?”   
  
Jester squints her eyes at the pair. “Flowers? Caleb is pointing at Yasha’s flower book, see?”   
  
“Yeah, fair. Makes sense.” Beau leans over to Jester’s sketchbook. “Are you gonna draw them?”   
  
Jester grins and winks at Beau. “Don’t tell them.” She puts her finger to her lips and Beau grins back. She makes a key locking motion over her mouth and throws the invisible key over her shoulder.   
  
“My lips are sealed.”   
  
Jester stifles her giggling behind her hand and starts to draw, her head swaying from side to side. Yasha and Caleb, seemingly oblivious, continue to sing.

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to take a peek at my [cr twitter](https://twitter.com/nottanycritter) and [cr tumblr](https://nottanothercritter.tumblr.com). <3


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